iv. 11. Ward retains the senarius. Dyce thinks 'corrupted,' and queries, 'As Agenor's damsel did,' for 'through the deep' is almost a repetition of 'through the seas.'—Wagner: 'like Europa through the deep.'—Perhaps (says Palgrave acc. to Ward) the dramatist pronounced the name Ágenor. We might then scan:—
And vénture as Ágenor's dámsel thróugh the deép.
But it is quite as likely that Greene intended, or let slip, a senarius. ix. 112. The quartos are right, and we should scan thus:—
Reìmès, Lovaín, and faí-r Rótherdam.
For 'fayer,' etc., see B 1, above. By altering to 'Rheims,' Do., Dy., G., and W. miss the metre. G., for instance, reads 'Rheims [and]'; Elze (Notes on Elizab. Dramatists, Halle, 1886, cxcix): 'Of Rheíms, of Loúvain ánd fair Rótterdám'; Knaut: 'Rheims, Loúvain, Páris ánd.' But if we preserve the spelling of the quartos the scansion is simple.
A Few Conclusions.—Greene was sensitive to dramatic niceties of utterance. Hence most of the metrical idiosyncrasies which are improperly called irregularities. An induction from the instances cited under C above shows that the following were the conditions of utterance to which he accorded special elocutionary recognition: the pause before a question or a response and the increase of emphasis upon the syllable succeeding the silence; the pause for reflection, and the pause before deliberate utterance; decision attending a command; the pause of speechless anger; the stoppage due to sighing, sobbing, horror, or any recoil of emotion; the period of, or after, a gesture, an inarticulate cry, a burst of laughter, an exclamatory remark; the pause during the suppression of the self-explanatory. The examination of his practice in Friar Bacon shows that in order to represent these conditions in dramatic blank verse Greene availed himself of silent beats with a uniformity that might be called system, were it the outcome of anything less spontaneous than the rhetorical instinct and the feeling for rhythm. Subordinating these to his knowledge of stage 'business,' Greene seems, then, to have developed a metrical use of the lacuna somewhat like this:—
- Before an important affirmation, the name of one addressed in exclamation, an inquiry, an imperative request, a command;
- At the transition from one form of utterance to another, the suppression of word or words understood, the gulp of rage, the burst of laughter;
- After an outcry.
These conclusions are confirmed by an examination of the other plays in which the text is fairly authentic. The dramatist naturally and, in that sense, intentionally suited his 'lines' to the histrionic emergency: an achievement not difficult for one of his rhetorical quality, who was also familiar with the practice of the stage. On similar grounds and with a regard likewise for the conditions of verse at the time, his senarii are to be retained and defended.
Most of the attempts to reduce his dramatic blank verse to anything like measured uniformity are, therefore, in my opinion academic and superfluous. They are indeed worse, for not only do they ignore the personal equation, they tend to pervert the data from which the history of English metres must be derived. There may, of course, be lines, like vi. 17 and ix. 47 of this play, where dramatist or intermediary has unwittingly omitted something, or actor wantonly added, but they are few; and unless the sense calls out for orthopædic assistance, no literary, historical, or philological interest is subserved by doctoring the text.